: As long as we are on the subject:
: Something, I have thought of often but yet to impliment is to store
: my iron tools on a blocks of zinc. They use "zinks" in
: marine applications to preserve iron keels and aluminum
: outdrives. Has anyone tried it for tools?

That's a little bit of a different beast. That is called a "sacrificial anode" and as the name suggests, it is designed to sacrifice itself instead of the metal, but it is sacrificing against electrolysis, which is enhanced by salt water. It isn't so much stopping rust, but rather corrosion by electrolysis, called galvanic corrosion. It wouldn't have any effect with stopping rust topsides.

There are actually formulas to figure out just the right anode for your particular vessel so that you have just the right amount of zinc to offset the metals underwater. The most amazing thing I have seen are these little rings that you can buy for setting fish pots and lobster pots. You tie a buoy to the ring, throw the pot in the water, and the pot drags the buoy down with it. The rings are made of zinc and are designed to corrode in salt water at a specific rate. You buy them for 24, 48, 72 hours. My friend had put a string out and I went out to help him bring them in. He used a GPS to mark them so he knew exactly where they were. We got there exactly 24 hours after he put them under. We sat there and he said, "They're here, they should be popping up pretty soon." Well lo and behold, right then they all started to pop up at exactly the same intervals at which we had thrown them in, exactly 24 hours from the time we did it, and all just by a little zinc ring that is designed to corrode within a specific amount of time. Amazing stuff.

Back to rust stopping, they do sell a thing that you can put in your tool drawer that emits a layer of gas of some sort due to some sort of chemical reaction, and that layer blankets the tools and keeps moisture out. Supposedly it works, but of course it depends on a good tight seal on the drawers. A couple of months ago Fine Woodworking did a test of rust preventative measures. You can look it up there.